Years ago James Ellroy wanted to appropriate a real character, Freddy Otash, a former policeman turned detective dedicated to extorting the powerful of Hollywood, politics and finance, to feed the magazine ‘Confidential’, a journalistic dump feared by everyone. He tells it in ‘Panic’ (Random House Literature), his new novel.
“I am the DIABOLIC DOG”, greets Ellroy, like this in Spanish, grotesquely theatrical to demonstrate that Cervantes’ language does not resist him. His Spanish lexicon is quite reduced and soon his screams go into a loop and the dog transforms. “I am the DEVIL’S DONKEY,” he says as he looks at you out of the corner of his eye, observing the effect caused. The most renowned North American black novel author, the ‘macho man’ of ‘noir’, has returned to Barcelona with his batteries set. Still, his overall style is much less aggressive than in past decades.
‘Panic’ is a pure Ellroy concentrate. Do you agree?
I’ll tell you what it is. It’s a concoction that mixes my obsession with Los Angeles in the 50s. My fondness for scandal journalism. My obsession with the city police department. My madness for women. My anticommunism. My very clear distaste for James Dean as well as for the director, and fucking communist, Nicholas Ray. Also my hatred for the rapist Caryl Chessman who ended up in the gas chamber in 1960 after having convinced the whole world of his redemption through his books. All this seasoned with a lot of fun, humor, robberies, dealings, listening and torture.
Why did you abandon the continuity of the writing of the 2nd Los Angeles Quartet for this novel?
It was him for the covid. I got distracted. So I took a short novel I wrote 10 years ago about Freddy Otash and wanted to put it together with two other short pieces, but I wasn’t convinced. So I decided to write two more parts and the result can be said to be a novel.
Otash is a despicable guy, but he gets the reader to like him.
Real life Otash was a sack of shit.
In what sense?
He was a bad guy. An unscrupulous thug without the slightest charm. No one could trust him.
It can be said that it has humanized him.
If you have access to the thoughts of a character, as is the case, you understand what that way of life and its contradictions meant. The fictional Otash kills but is always paying widows off when he kills someone. Besides, my Otash is always looking for love.
You are a romantic.
Yeaaaah. I am the romantic DOG.
What intimate things has he lent to Otash?
We share the same curiosity. He is a peeping pervert, who is always snooping through windows. For a long time, in my adolescence, I also dedicated myself to that. He entered houses to sniff women’s underwear. Luckily that happened.
Kennedy was a mediocre president with a lifestyle marked by the seduction of women and drugs
Why do you hate President Kennedy so much?
I don’t exactly hate him. In fact, I really liked his brother Bob. But I don’t understand the prestige he carries. He was a mediocre president and because of his lifestyle marked by the seduction of women and drugs it is quite believable that he would have needed the services of Otash.
So you don’t accept that Kennedy was a breath of fresh air in the 1960s landscape?
Yes, but what did you do with it? Any. He was an attractive guy, he had a sense of humor and ideals, but he cannot be compared to Eisenhower, the president who preceded him and who also had ideals.
Kennedy and James Dean are part of the post-war myth and you destroy them at will.
Dean was a bad person. A thug who treated people badly, manipulated his gay classmates, he was a bad actor. I wanted to puncture the inflated balloon of his fame. He is remembered more for how he spanked her. And yes, he stayed there in the middle of a mess of twisted iron, but that doesn’t make him a better person. He must have realized that it is difficult for me to destroy myths (he laughs loudly).
Do you feel better regarded now than a few years ago?
I think I have a much higher literary reputation in Europe than in the United States. They take me much more seriously here. The level of literary criticism in the United States is stupid. Anyone can make a review if they are a user of Instagram, Facebook or Twitter.
His father was part of that somewhat underground world of Hollywood. Aren’t you planning to write about him?
Do not.
But he boasted of having had an affair with Rita Hayworth. There is a story there.
Yes, and I have chosen to believe it. In fact, her name appears in a biography about the actress because in the 1940s she worked as an artist manager and a decade earlier she had met and worked for the actress’s family, the Cansinos, in Mexico, where she lived for a while. . She spoke good Spanish and worked as a bookmaker for the Aguacalientes horse races.
I am convinced that the Scriptures are literally and infallibly true: original sin was caused by an apple
‘Panic’ is presented as a confession. What role does religion play in your life?
I am a Christian, I believe in God and in the resurrection. I am convinced that the Scriptures are literally and infallibly true: original sin was caused by an apple. And yes, I am a Christian writer. Joyce Carol Oates paid me a great compliment when she called me the American Dostoevsky. Dostoevsky has a great feeling for sin and redemption. He does not imagine a world without God, that is why he assures that when God does not exist, everything is allowed. I see God everywhere and I bring all these horrible men to this moment of confession.
Does this mean that you have finally been able to read ‘Crime and Punishment’?
No, I have tried several times and I have not been able to. Maybe because he is the Russian Ellroy (laughs).
In his novels there is a strong concentration of human filth. Does it feel good to describe them?
I always write in a state of great nervousness, but at the same time very controlled. These books are dense and complex, with many layers. There is violence and passions. And yet, from a stylistic point of view, they are very rigorous. In addition, the sexual scenes are very diluted, they are reserved and not at all explicit.
Who do you think reads you better, men or women?
Most of my readers are men but I write for God and for the world.
They call me a fascist, a racist, a homophobe, a misogynist. Always the same litany. I peel it
What do the readers tell you? How do you deal with those criticisms?
They say, “Ellroy is a fascist, a racist, a homophobe, a misogynist.” He always the same litany. He peels me. Give them As they say in Italy: “Va fan culo & rdquor ;.
It is curious but the most influential feminist movement in recent years, the MeToo, arises from a scandal hatched in Hollywood.
Weinstein’s is a good story but since it doesn’t happen in the 50s, I will never write about it.
Still not watching current movies?
I only watch boxing and old movies on TV.
In other words, he finally confesses that he has a television.
It’s my wife, Helen Knode, who has it. Well, Helen was my wife, then my ex, and now she’s my girlfriend. She lives very close.
He looks much calmer than on previous visits. Has Helen had anything to do with it?
His love has tamed me. She has trained the evil dog. She is also a woman who writes. She has published two crime novels and is writing a novel about a talking dog. We both really like dogs, especially bull terriers.
‘Panic’ is a book with a great sense of humor. Has something happened in your life to make it like this?
I wanted to show the life of men, always in search of love, love, love, as something ridiculous. My whole life has many laughable moments, I know what I’m talking about. In fact, writing about men like this is a way of showing my solidarity with women by exposing their ridiculousness.
It will turn out that you are a feminist.
In a way, yes. A canine feminist. Dogs are friendly and seek affection, but if they don’t like you they will bite you. It’s pretty silly but that’s how it is.
I have sent money to help Ukraine because I hate Putin who is a fucking bastard
After ‘Pánico’ have you returned to writing for the quartet?
No, that will have to wait. I’m writing another Freddy Otash novel, with a very different tone than this one. It will not be so grotesque and much more serious. In the United States and Spain it is very likely that it will be published within a year and a half.
I suppose you have put that pin on your lapel with the Ukrainian flag so that we journalists ask you about current affairs and you can remind us that you do not talk about politics.
Don’t worry. Ask me.
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Why is he wearing it?
I remember being eight years old in 1965 when Russian tanks entered Budapest, Hungary, to put down the revolt against the communist government. The Russians killed thousands of people. For me it was very impressive. The current situation reminds me of this moment. So I have sent money to help Ukraine and I wear this pin. Because I hate Putin who is a fucking fucking. This has to end now. And if not, I can send Freddy Otash to kill him (final chuckles).